"The first truth is that the liberty of a democracy is not safe if the people tolerate the growth of private power to a point where it becomes stronger than their democratic state itself. That, in its essence, is fascism — ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. ”
— Franklin D. Roosevelt

Monday, November 02, 2009

Tired of those pesky socialists? Let's go to that Libertarian Paradise!

8 comments:

You have indicated more than once that you are "trying to save capitalism" from itself. On other occasions, you have expressed that you are moving toward--if not actually advocating--various types of socialism. I do not think you or any of your fellows can reconcile those two forms of argument. I am curious to know with which of them you actually stand.

Though the question was not meant for me, I would like to respond if I may.

100% of either philosophy is too much. Capitalism can be a good, beneficial thing if properly diluted with the right amount of Socialism.Everybody wants to point the finger at anything that seeks to temper capitalism-gone-wrong, which is the form of capitalism we find so pervasive today, and whine "socialism!".

When capitalism (and I am a business owner) is used as a method of preying upon people it ceases to be productive and becomes parasitic.Capitalism was designed to help people live better and give the individual the opportunity to achieve what they can according to their ability.But when the achievement becomes a predatory action, costing people their livelihoods and often their lives, it becomes a disease as opposed to a productive economic philosophy.

Socialism is the cure.

When corporation loses it's sense of morality it becomes Fascism. Fascism must die.Socialism, when gone too far, can interfere with the right of the individual to accomplish their dreams. It can interfere with individuality in general. Though this is far more rare than the damage caused by Corporate Fascism which is automatic, it is equally unacceptable.There are several different kinds of Socialism. Few people manage to make it beyond the Glenn Beck version. All I can say to those types is tell it to their gran'mama and refuse the Medicare payments next time she falls down.

In order to save Capitalism from it's self we must give it a healthy dose of Socialism.Passive Capitalism is good Capitalism. Predatory Capitalism is evil.It's not okay to target people, deceive them, bleed them dry then just say "oh well, that's business".

Greetings to the Captain and Cracker: As a start, it's also impermissible to literally tell people not harming anyone and may actually be trying to alleviate societal wrongs that in the name of justice or inclusion or tolerance that they need to be told how to do what it is they are already doing. Socialism, of which as you suggest, there are many varieties, is premised on the notion that it can "correct" the excesses of capitalism through legislative fiat that tells usually decnt, caring people what they need to do to become "more" decent and "caring.". If, however, such fiat does not work or those for whom the fiat was supposedly intended do not like the fiat for their own reasons--say, they know more about their situation than the governmental apparatus trying to implement it--the inevitable result has been and will be again and again and again that the fiat will be imposed by some form of force. It may not be anything more than condescension or social avoidance, but it will be force of some sort. Under the system you advocate, individual freedom comes not to be not cherished, but called a relic of the past. There are intellectual critics widely read throughout today who actually argue that there is no such thing as an individual; we are all instead constructs of our structures of power that need to be eliminated. How does socialism counter such an argument? How does socialism, with its insistence on centralized power and economic control, not almost inevitably descend into the very forms of oppression it claims to abhor? How, in short, does socialism actually work? Your basic assumptions further remain that people will respond with the same levels of economic productivity under governmental control than they do under a free market. Can you cite one instance from the previous or current century where such consistency has taken place? Can you honestly say that people's beahvior will dramatically alter itself from 10,000 years of previous patterns simply if we modify, alter or abolish what we now call "capitalism?" Is the malleability of people, as you and the Cracker suggest, dependent upon the economic system that surrounds them? Who then created the system? What socialists do not acknowledge is the reality of human nature as a real, unchanging and not too pleasant constant. True, it can undergo some alterations and learn to control itself (or have that control, if necessary, imposed through prison sentences and other forms of coercion). Misery, as it were, can be mitigated and, in my view, God calls us to be about that mitigating while always striving for its elimination. As subjective and mortal creatures, however, we will never achieve the completeness that socialists for almost 200 years have believed possible. The tragedy has become not so much a lack of understanding, but rather the stubborn refusal to admit that your basic premises are misplaced and, in the wrong hands with the right technology, very, very dangerous. More later--

Havng just seen the clip, maybe the Cracker can substitute his reference point to "Welcome to that Socialist Worker's paradise: North Korea!" Pictures of well-fed, smiling, singing workers dancing through their "white waves of rice" can be interspersed. Perhaps we can see even more images of voters frely choosing to continue living in their worker's paradise by standing in line to vote for Kim Jung-Il or his opponent, both of whom will respect the attitudes and choices of those same well-fed, happy, rice-flowing, singing voters. You can do better for your advocacy of government than creating a Somilian straw man (oops, person). I seem also to recall that well-functioning, democratic, justice-pursuing centralized government of the Soviet Union. Maybe the People's Republic of China? Maybe the Eastern block of Europe where people were killed trying to break in (or was it out?)? Maybe Cambodia and its fields of living peasants? Come, let us reason together and not reduce each other's thoughts to foolishness.

"When capitalism is used as a method of preying upon people it ceases to be productive and becomes parasitic." - and ceases to be capitalism. Capitalism is the free trade of value for value among consenting individuals, without either party resorting to force or fraud. Those are the province of socialism.